Ernest Hébrard

Reconstruction of the Palace of the Roman Emperor Diocletian in its original appearance upon completion in 305 CE, by Ernest Hébrard

Ernest Hébrard (1875–1933) was a French architect, archaeologist and urban planner who completed major projects in Greece, Morocco, and French Indochina. He is renowned for his urban plan for the redevelopment of the center of Thessaloniki in Greece after a great fire in 1917.

Work in Greece

The majority of Thessaloniki was largely destroyed in the Great Fire of 1917. The Greek Prime Minister Eleftherios Venizelos forbade the reconstruction of the city center until a modern city plan was approved. He commissioned Ernest Hébrard for the work, which the architect conceived and developed with the aid of the Greek architects Aristotelis Zachos and Konstantinos Kitsikis.[1] The plan did away with the medieval and Oriental (Ottoman) features of Thessaloniki, preserved its Byzantine heritage, and transformed it into a city with boulevards and contemporary roadways, squares and parks. Hébrard taught at the National Technical University of Athens, and his work is well known in the architecture schools of Greece.

Work in Africa and Asia

Hébrard was also involved in major projects in Africa and Asia, such as the upgrading of Casablanca, the reconstruction of Diocletian's palace at Split, and later the planning for the main cities in French Indochina. He was appointed the head of the Indochina Architecture and Town Planning Service in 1923. He worked to incorporate into the French architecture being built there elements of vernacular design from the colonial territories of French Indochina, now Việt Nam, Cambodia and Laos.[2] He designed the Cửa Bắc Church in central Hanoi. Hébrard oversaw the design of the French hill station of Dalat in Annam, Vietnam's middle province.[3] After his work in Indochina he went again to Athens and worked for the Greek state.

In 1931 he returned to Paris, where he died at the age of 58 two years later.

See also

Aristotelous Square

References

  1. ↑ "Konstantinos Biris (1899-1980)". neohellenic architecture archives. Benaki Museum. Archived from the original on 2 April 2015. Retrieved 16 March 2015.
  2. ↑ Rujivacharakul, Vimalin; Hahn, H. Hazel; Oshima, Ken Tadashi; Christensen, Peter (2013). Architecturalized Asia: Mapping a Continent through History. Hong Kong University Press. p. 178. ISBN 978-988-8208-05-0.
  3. ↑ Crossette, Barbara (1998). The Great Hill Stations of Asia. Boulder, CO: Westview Press. ISBN 9780813333267.


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